: Technically, you have no need to leave the starting room, since it contains
: the only active terminal and the only working shield charger (not to
: mention shotgun shells - so many, many shotgun shells). However, you can
: get out and explore more of the station, so why not? At least the lights
: are working and the enemies are normal (if frustrating), so it seems like
: we've woken up from our "dream." Maybe. Those are some extremely
: disconcerting groaning noises echoing in the background...
Technically indeed. Given that you just earlier said that our mission here is to "survive", I have never found staying in this room -practical-! Not helped by the fact that the last time I entered this level it was on a sliver of health! That's a lot of runs through green skilsaw blades and a lot of deaths upon materialising in the station!
I always make a run for the narrow corridor full of shotgun shells, and hang a right to get that 2x recharge pill asap! The hunters tend not to like to follow one in there as it is a bit cramped for them. Sometimes heading there also spawns a S'pht'Kr. That means there was some measure of success in this timeline after all - oh that's right, there was the large object entering the system at the end of Confound Delivery, and this guy is all we have to show for it. The sadder thought, as was brought up I think in Volunteers: where does he teleport out to when his job is done? Off to join R'chzne I suspect :(.
The respawning juggernaut makes it hard to even read the terminal here - most frustrating - and I usually head for the teleporter out down below instead. That's right, one of the arms from the room that surrounds the lift in the starting room, if we take it down, ends in a teleporter that serves the same purpose as the terminal - perhaps for that very reason, that it is a right pain to read?
For a failing world, this place sure has a lot of ammo to offer. There are caches of shotgun shells hidden high and low in the starting room, with a little teleporter that sends you up onto some block platforms. There is also the bunch in front of what would be the door leading to the dropoff to the vidmaster challenge; the shotgun corridor and plenty more where we get the 2x pill. The starting room of course has plenty as well, as does the room outside the lift downstairs. And oh how convenient it all is for the coming levels. The fusion and shotgun stuff is great for the vacuum levels, and more forward thinking, the SPNKR makes a big difference to our approach to Thing What Kicks... in terms of ignoring the juggernauts or not.
And all because, for some reason, this time around we do not lose all our weapons and ammo when we take the new path. Something is different. And odd, because Durandal doesn't seem at all surprised. For what we take to be a fresh wakeup, there is no preamble of where to find weapons or anything in Acme Station. Curiouser.
